Better Take Him Home
by templeg
Summary: Follow-up to Don't You Live Alone. James tells Remus and Sirius. MWPP-era.


It's barely six in the morning and still dark when Remus is woken by the _whoosh_ of someone Flooing into the living room. For a moment, he thinks that this is how it all ends- not falling in a blaze of light with the air around him full of curses, but lying in their narrow bed with Sirius drooling into the hollow of his collarbone, wearing the ratty striped pajamas he's had since sixth year, helpless, immobile. He fumbles for his wand on the bedside table with one hand and shakes Sirius awake with the other.

'Mnnnuhhh?' says Sirius into his shoulder. Remus gropes around for a second before he finds the lamp and turns it on, squinting in the sudden light. Sirius groans and presses his face into Remus' chest. 'Whyzzuh- nrghhhh.'

'Sirius, wake _up'_, he whispers, trying not to let his voice shake, because even if it isn't Death Eater hordes, and surely if it was they would have burst in by now, he doesn't want to think about what sort of news is so urgent that it has to be imparted at this hour of the morning. He wonders if he'll emerge into the living room to find someone crumpled and dying, James or Peter or any of the Order, or if he'll be hauled into the fireplace and away to drag hysterical, uncomprehending Muggles out of a burning ruin crackling with magic, or to pound breathless and blind through flashes and bangs and screams, firing spells over his shoulder and praying he doesn't trip or run headlong into a tree or an explosion or a spell, all without even the chance to change out of his stupid pajamas.

'_There's someone in the other room_', he hisses. Sirius stiffens and grabs his wand from his side of the bed. They slip out from under the covers, and Remus holds his breath as he pads across the floorboards. He gingerly cracks open the door, Sirius hovering behind him.

The first thing they see is a dark shape huddled on the sofa, and Remus' heart gives an unpleasant thud. They step into the room and James looks up at them, moonlight glinting off his glasses.

'James?' says Remus. 'What are you doing here? What time is it?' When James is silent he presses on, cold dread swirling in the pit of his stomach. 'What is it, what's happened?'

'It's Lily', says James, voice hollow, and of all the scenarios swarming unbidden around Remus' brain, this was the last thing he expected. He sees Lily sprawled among wreckage, eyes glazed and staring, red hair streaked and matted with dust and blood, and he feels bile rise in his throat. 'What-', he manages, 'Who did it, fuck, how could-'

James gives a shaky laugh. 'It's not that.' He stares down at his clasped hands in his lap. 'Lily, she's-' He gulps. 'She's going to have a baby.'

No one says anything. Remus seems to have lost the ability to formulate words, because thank_ god_, she's not dead, no-one's dead, but it's too huge to take in and it feels like they're doing all the grown-up things of a lifetime all at once already, and James can barely tie his own shoelaces, and has he ever even been near a baby? Remus tries to imagine James changing nappies and warming milk, and fails entirely.

'I'm going to be a _dad_', croaks James. 'What the _fuck _do I do?'

'I think', says Sirius, 'you've already, ah, made your contribution. I could be wrong, of course…'

James snorts. 'No', he says, helplessly, 'but, with the war, and…what if something…how could I… what if something _happens_?'

There is another awful silence. They've been living with this for years now, this knowledge that there is no safety, that any day they could suddenly cease to be with no warning, no goodbyes. It delivers an ludicrous solemnity to the most mundane of actions- he can be eating breakfast in the morning and think, staring down at it, _this could be my last ever bowl of muesli_. When he and Sirius kiss now they kiss harder, as though trying to leave something of themselves on each other's lips, so that if they die apart they will not be entirely without one another. He can't imagine what it would be like for a child, growing up in a world like that.

'It won't', says Sirius, with no conviction at all. 'It can't.'

James gives a wobbly sort of smile. Sirius strides to the fridge, pulls out a beer and tosses it to James, who catches it one-handed and opens it in a move Remus could never, ever pull off. At moments like this it's obvious why so many people mistake James and Sirius for brothers. Remus observes them with the detachment of an outsider to this brotherhood (and thank God for that, or things between him and Sirius would be more than a little awkward). He watches Sirius particularly closely, not sure how he was expecting him to take it. He's gripping the edge of the counter hard with both hands and when their eyes meet he glances sharply away, but his expression is mostly unreadable.

James downs the rest of his beer with impressive speed and stands up rather abruptly, wavering between the sofa and the fireplace. 'I better…' he says, gesturing vaguely. 'Lily…' He seizes a handful of powder from the jar on the mantelpiece and is about to step in when he turns and grins at them, his entire face splitting in two. 'Isn't it sort of brilliant, though?' Then he's gone in a whoosh of green flames.

Sirius comes round the counter and flops down on the sofa. Remus watches him silently for a moment, waiting.

'I won't get back to sleep now', says Sirius suddenly. He holds out his hand, and Remus sits down next to him, leaning hesitantly into his side. 'It is brilliant', says Sirius after a moment. 'Christ, they're going to be a proper _family_. Isn't that sickening?'

'Mmmm', says Remus, 'and we'll be the eccentric poofter uncles who buy the noisiest, most impractical presents in the world and piss Lily off no end'. He pats Sirius' thigh almost unconsciously as he stands up and instantly sees them in ten years time, wearing loud shirts and talking entirely in obnoxious in-jokes. He gives a shudder. 'Tea?'

They sit slurping tea from chipped mugs as the first anemic rays of light penetrate the apartment, ankles tangled together like they've done since they used to play footsie in Potions, Sirius' foot worming its way practically into his lap so that he got his ingredients mixed up and melted yet another cauldron. Sirius' fingers are wound into the material at the back of his neck, his thumb absent-mindedly rubbing circles into Remus' skin. It strikes Remus how very domesticated they really are, no less so, really, than Lily and James. He supposes, as Sirius kisses him and he tastes camomile, that he doesn't mind, on the whole.


End file.
